


A Clam in a Shell

by indigo_inkpot



Series: You Might As Well Live [3]
Category: Voltron: Legendary Defender
Genre: Chronic Illness, Cuddling & Snuggling, Laundry, Multi, Napping, Polydins, mentions of the other paladins and Matt, why do I keep giving Lance laundry to do?
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2019-04-09
Updated: 2019-04-09
Packaged: 2020-01-01 01:26:37
Rating: Teen And Up Audiences
Warnings: No Archive Warnings Apply
Chapters: 1
Words: 1,893
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/18325895
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/indigo_inkpot/pseuds/indigo_inkpot
Summary: This didn't go where I intended it to go; Shiro and Keith take a nap and Lance is pedantic about pillows.





	A Clam in a Shell

**Author's Note:**

  * For [goldkirk](https://archiveofourown.org/users/goldkirk/gifts).



> Work is the province of cattle,  
> And rest's for a clam in a shell,  
> So I'm thinking of throwing the battle--  
> Would you kindly direct me to hell?
> 
> ~ Coda, Dorothy Parker 
> 
> Dedicated to goldkirk, who writes some beautifully sweet stories and has been so supportive, even in the face of my spammy twitter DMs. <3

They work surprisingly well, for a bunch of different personalities with different sleep schedules. There's usually one night of every week when they all fall into bed in the same pile together, when Pidge isn't pulling all nighters and Hunk isn't getting up to check the rise of his bread experiments every few hours. When Keith isn't drawn to the windowseat, where he'll stargaze for hours or challenge Lance to some of the strategy games they had collected on their travels. Neither of them handle insomnia well, but they find it easier to cope together than on their own. Sometimes, Shiro will sit on the pillows Lance kicks off the windowseat and watches them play, Keith's free hand playing with his hair. Both Shiro and Matt have nights where pain overrides every other biological need, they usually end up sitting on the living room floor (or lying, if Matt's leg is playing up that much) playing video games until they can see the graphics burned into the backs of their eyelids.

As a group, they can handle sleeping. They can also handle _not_ _sleeping_.

Mornings are a different story.

Shiro wouldn't necessarily call himself a morning person. He can get up decently early, brew his best attempt at coffee and hope to outrun his sleepiness by getting on with his day.

Well, he used to. Now, he either stumbles out with at least one other person clinging to him, or he's dragged out by the need to eat or pee. Or Lance, who is fiercely protective of their shared laundry schedule. Something about pillowcases being a petri-dish of bacteria and dead skin. Shiro doesn't have the heart to tell him that he's the only one actually using his pillow that often; Keith and Pidge rarely use pillows, they're so often wrapped around each other, whereas Shiro and Hunk are both guilty of hoarding pillows to share between themselves.

Today is laundry day, and as such, Shiro found himself evicted by Lance as soon as Keith had crawled out of bed to shower. Huffing, he manages to bundle a decently clean-smelling blanket against his chest and stumble out to the sofa. Lance puts up a token protest before apparently deciding one blanket isn't worth dealing with the possessive and downright whiny mood that hangs over Shiro whenever he's woken up before he's ready.

Shiro's slowly becoming accustomed to sofa naps. On board the Castle, there was never anywhere that felt truly safe; his room was unfamiliar, no matter how he messed with the environmental controls, it was always just cold enough to set him on edge, and the only sofas felt exposed. Now, he knows intimately the sounds of their apartment; the way the oven sounds when Hunk is warming it up for dinner, the hum of their fridge, the way Pidge's cold cathode display, made from a mashup of odd alien tech, hanging on the wall chirps softly as it counts Earth and Altean time parallel to each other. He knows that the only people who can see him, talk to him, touch him, are the people he trusts most in the world. Nobody else is watching.

Here, on the sofa they all pitched in to buy, and all cursed trying to cram it through the apartment door, Shiro has more privacy than he ever remembers. Before being a Paladin, before the Galra, before Adam and the Garrison, before he was a teenager with a desperate craving for a privacy matched only by an equally desperate fear of being alone - he's never alone here, but he's never felt more secure.

Sure, Lance will go on about how he's judging him for not brushing his teeth, Matt constantly pokes fun at his pyjamas (even though he's responsible for most of Shiro's novelty pants, and the most likely person to steal them) and Hunk will smile fondly every time Shiro commits well-meaning sabotage in the kitchen. But he's never criticized anymore, instruction comes in the form of arms around his waist in the bathroom, hands guiding his around unfamiliar motions in their kitchen.

He comes back to reality with a thump - literally - as a freshly showered Keith vaults over the back of the sofa and lands on the cushion by Shiro's head. He bends over his crossed legs and presses his lips against Shiro's temple.

"Good morning," Keith laughs at Shiro's groan, "It's my day off, what do you feel like doing?"

"Is sleep an option?" Shiro murmurs into his blanket, looking up at Keith hopefully. It's growing closer to winter now, and the morning light coming in greys and blues through the living room window makes Keith glow, lighting up his sly grin.

"You get one hour, I know you like a lie in when it's cold, but seriously, I want a day out of you, and I'll get it." He leans down again, brushing through Shiro's slightly fluffy undercut and pressing kisses along his hairline. Shiro sneaks his hand up and tangles it in the collar of Keith's hoodie, pulling until he relents and moves to curl up against him.

* * *

They know more than an hour has passed, because Lance has come charging back up the stairs from the laundry room with a full basket, and neither of them heard him leave. Keith's head pokes over the sofa, sleepy eyes surveying the room and squinting against the bright light of the midday sun pouring into the room. It's brighter than when they went to sleep - a lot brighter - and Shiro grumbles as Keith moves and stops casting his shadow over the sofa, burrowing deeper into his blanket.

"He's still out?" Lance asks, from where he's draping pillowcases and towels over the clothes horse. Keith prods Shiro's back gently, moving to tickle light fingers up and down his spine. Nothing.

"Yup, he went down hard." Keith sighs, rubbing his eyes and then running his hand up into his hair. He needs a haircut, but Pidge has a full schedule this week, and deadlines all month, so he'll have to deal with being a little shaggy for a while longer.

"He wasn't the only one!" Lance cackled, kicking the laundry bag across the room. It sails halfway to the bedroom door then lands with a gentle _whoosh_.

"That was a solid 8/10 for effort and execution, but you're a dick, so I'm only gonna give you a 7." Lance pouts, and Keith relents, "7-and-a-half, then. Go start on the coffee while I wake Shiro up?"

"I'm going to pretend you gave me the 8 I deserve, and I'll even get out the nice creamer Hunk bought and didn't tell you about." Lance smirked, pulling Keith into a kiss. Keith rolls his eyes, turning back to the giant lump of blanket on the sofa and wondering how he'll drag Shiro out.

"Hey, Shiro?" Keith bends over, trying to peek around the edges of the blanket. The tuft of white hair he's able to uncover shifts and grumbles in response, but makes no effort to get up. "Come on, Lance is making coffee, it'll perk you up."

Shiro twitches, an attempt to bundle his blanket tighter, but Keith reacts, pulling the blanket down and away from his face. Shiro squints up at him, face twisting at the brightness of the room.

"You weren't this photosensitive this morning, right?" Keith frowns.

"Just tired," Shiro mumbles in response, "'m fine."

"I thought we had rules about that word," Lance interrupts, climbing over the sofa cushions and settling by Shiro's head.

Shiro whines. He really is _fine_ , though. He just needs more sleep, he was woken up before he was ready and he just needs to catch up. A tiny, grumpy part of him wants to blame Lance, adamant that if he'd been allowed to stay in bed he would've been okay and Keith wouldn't be wasting his day off. But he knows it isn't Lance's fault, so he squashes the bitter comment as far down as he can.

"'Time is it?" He asks instead, and when Lance tells him he slept through the whole morning, the noise that escapes him can only be described as an outright whimper. So much for sleeping this off. He feels like he could sleep for days before he's ready to wake up properly. 

He's halfway through apologising to Keith for ruining their date day when Keith gives up and resorts to lying across him, his weight squashing the air out of Shiro with a soft _"oof"_.

"Nope, the whole point of date day is to spend the day _with you_ , and I said I'd get a day out of you, so we're gonna go back to bed, drink some coffee, order in for lunch and ruin Matt's Netflix algorithm." Keith punctuates each activity on his list with a peck to the side of Shiro's head, smirking as Shiro's cheeks gradually turn pink, all frustration over his fatigue forgotten for now.

"Okay, let's get you up before you get sleepy again!" Lance holds out his hands to Shiro, making grabby gestures. Shiro stares at him for a second, before holding up the blanket he's wrapped in.

"Can I bring this?"

Keith tries so goddamn hard to suppress the snort of laughter as Lance visibly _twitches_.

"Just this once," Lance growls, "It can go in the wash tomorrow, I think Matt is planning on doing a colour load." He yanks Shiro up to standing before he can bargain for any more time napping on the sofa.

Shiro finds himself dragged into the bedroom, where Lance immediately begins rearranging pillows and organising bedding. Not that it matters to Shiro, who flops down with his blanket on Hunk's side of the bed.

"I'm not bringing the coffee in here while you're still nesting," Keith says from the doorway. He's got three cups of coffee in his hands, a sweating bottle of water under his elbow, and his messenger bag over his shoulder.

Lance stops at the promise of coffee, reaching out with two eager hands. Shiro eases up from where he's been burrowing down into the mattress and takes his coffee, which Keith seems to have poured a whole lot more sugar than usual into. Not that Shiro minds; he has half a chance of staying awake if he builds up a decent sugar rush or caffeine high. Keith shakes the water bottle at him threateningly, before placing it on the bedside table and sliding into the middle of the bed. He pulls his messenger bag open, and out comes his tablet. Lance swoops in and steals it, pressing up against Keith shoulder to knee so he can chatter away about Matt's choice in tv shows.

Shiro, having drunk as much of his coffee as he can possibly stomach, leaves his mug - one with a scarily accurate colour-changing outline of Coran's moustache on the side - on the nightstand and rolls over to face the others, bundling a pillow under his head. Keith's free hand reaches across to brush through his hair.

He falls asleep listening to Lance and Keith bicker over a show where, of all things, a captain and her crew find themselves catapulted into the depths of unknown space, trying to find their way home. He wonders if he'll wake up in time to find out whether they meet any Lions along the way.

**Author's Note:**

> If we were to do an alignment chart of pillows, Lance is Lawful Good; washes his pillowcase regularly, washes everyone else's while he's at it. Shiro and Hunk are Chaotic Good; using pillows but not necessarily their own, hoarding and sharing, absolute pillow princesses. Keith and Pidge are walking the line between Chaotic Neutral - Chaotic Evil; pillows are for smothering people and pillow fights, they'd much rather sleep on each other and a variety of bundled blankets, also known as True Nesters.
> 
> I'm a Chaotic Good, what about you guys?
> 
> Also I promise I will write Lance doing something other than laundry some day, but he just seems like the type that's so reliable about that sort of thing, and I'm kinda projecting the huge pile of laundry I wish someone would come and do for me...oops?
> 
> (I even shoehorned in a Voyager reference, my bf would be proud)
> 
> Edit: I posted this at 2am and now I'm fixing things because I'm a disaster.


End file.
